MOVIE - Marshall

PG-13 (1:58)

Wide release 10-13-17

Viewed Tuesday evening, 10-17-17 at the Regal Theater in Harrisburg
IMBd:  6.8

T Critic: 87     Audience:  87
Critic's Consensus:  Marshall takes an illuminating, well-acted look at its real-life subject's early career that also delivers as an entertainingly old-fashioned courtroom drama.

Cag:  5/Loved it

Directed by Reginald Hudlin

Open Road Films

Chadwick Boseman, Josh Gad, Sterling K. Brown, Kate Hudson, James Cromwell

My comments:  What an excellent movie!  I particularly loved all the humor and the growing relationship between Samuel Friedman and Thurgood Marshall.  Perhaps these parts were added with "creative license," in that writing a biopic about something that happened 76 years ago (1941) can't be full of the truth, and this is a movie, after all, not a documentary. The actors, and acting, were superb (although Kate Hudson's portrayal seemed a little off to me). Powerful storytelling about a piece of our history - a LARGE piece - that is shaming and shameful.  There was an older (white) couple sitting behind me in the theater that were cheering and clapping every time something positive happened, or every time someone put an arrogant white person in their place.  They applauded at the end.  That's how I felt, applause is necessary.  Highly recommended.

RT/ IMDb Summary:  Starring Chadwick Boseman, Josh Gad, Kate Hudson, Dan Stevens, Sterling K. Brown, and James Cromwell. Director Reginald Hudlin's Marshall, is based on an early trial in the career of Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall. It follows the young lawyer (Chadwick Boseman) to conservative Connecticut to defend a black chauffeur (Sterling K. Brown) charged with sexual assault and attempted murder of his white socialite employer (Kate Hudson). Muzzled by a segregationist court, Marshall partners with a courageous young Jewish lawyer, Samuel Friedman (Josh Gad). Together they mount the defense in an environment of racism and Anti-Semitism. The high profile case and the partnership with Friedman served as a template for Marshall's creation of the NAACP legal defense fund.